Comprehensive consultations on Europe

2018 was the year of reflection on the future of Europe. In order to understand the hopes and fears of citizens of Latvia regarding the future of European Union, more than 1500 citizens have been engaged in consultations that took place both in the regions of Latvia and online. Consultations were co-organized by state institutions and civil society organisations using various experimental formats.

Innovation Summary

Innovation Overview

SHORT OVERVIEW

Around 837 people took part in 23 events on the future of Europe organised in Latvia during the summer and autumn of 2018. More than half of these events were organised by civil society organisations experimenting with different formats to engage general public in the debate on Europe.

In addition, a large-scale idea crowdsourcing action was organized online in a dedicated online platform Dialogi par Eiropas Nākotni (Dialogues on the Future of Europe) collecting citizens’ ideas on creating more wealth, happiness, security and justice for Europe. Altogether more than 370 ideas were collected, and 721 registered participants (around 1 500 not registered participants) took part in online voting casting their votes 26233 times for the ideas they considered as being the best.

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EXTENDED OVERVIEW

Citizens’ consultations on Europe in Latvia were organised from summer through to November 2018. Consultations took place in various regions of Latvia, in Riga and online.

About a half of all citizens’ consultations were organized by civil society organisations active either locally or at the national level, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs provided funding to cover their expenses.

Organizers of citizens’ consultations were free to choose their own formats for arranging the consultations; some of organizers chose a traditional discussion format while others opted for more innovative formats, such as workshops or brainstorms. All event organizers were prompted to choose conversations with the audience over lectures and expert commentaries. Organizers of the events and/or civil society observers wrote a summary about each event, particularly noting the main thematic categories and concerns discussed by participants, as well as the ideas on the future of Europe.

In parallel to regional consultations, the ideas on the future of Europe were collected on the online platform Dialogi par Eiropas Nākotni (Dialogues on the Future of Europe) https://manaeiropa.manabalss.lv. This platform is part of the popular e-petitioning platform ManaBalss. Both the citizens who attended the consultations and everyone else were encouraged to come up with their own ideas and to vote on ideas submitted by others. Ideas collected during the regional consultations were also added to the idea pool on the platform.

Overall, 374 ideas on the future of Europe were collected on the Dialogi par Eiropas Nākotni platform, and 721 participants voted on the ideas collected there casting their votes 26233 times for the ideas they preferred. Citizens of Latvia were asked to vote for ideas separated into randomly chosen pairs within specific thematic groupings (for example, how to make Europe more secure?) This method was chosen in order to enable the idea collection and voting to happen in parallel. This method allows to discern the ideas that are the most and least often supported by participants when these ideas are contrasted with some other suggestion proposed by participants in that thematic grouping.

At the conclusion of the regional consultations and online idea collection, two Latvian civil society organisations – Centre for Public Policy PROVIDUS and Civic Alliance Latvia – wrote a summary report on citizens’ consultations on Europe in Latvia.

The summary report is available on PROVIDUS website here: http://providus.lv/en/article/report-on-citizens-consultations-on-europe-in-latvia

Innovation Description

What Makes Your Project Innovative?

These consultations were innovative because:
1) Ministry of Foreign Affairs and various civil society organisations cooperated to set up an innovative framework for consultations and to organise consultation events both online and offline.
2) Consultations provided the space for experimentation on different formats for public engagement (brainstorms, debates, conversations, idea crowdsourcing actions, etc).
3) The summary report of the consultations was drafted by civil society organisation, and its main conclusions were presented by the prime minister of Latvia during the European Council meeting in December 2018. The summary report was also part of parliamentary deliberations on Latvia's foreign and European policy in January 2019.

What is the current status of your innovation?

The project is finished, but it is sill relevant in Latvia's deliberations on the future of Europe. Its main conclusions were presented by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Latvia to the Parliament for their annual deliberations on Latvia's Foreign and European policy. It is expected that the summary conclusions will be important for the Prime Minister of Latvia during informal European Council on the future of Europe in Sibiu (May, 2019)

Innovation Development

Collaborations & Partnerships

About a half of all citizens’ consultations were organised by civil society organisations active either locally or at the national level, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs provided funding to cover their expenses. In parallel to regional consultations, the ideas on the future of Europe were collected on the online platform Dialogi par Eiropas Nākotni. At the conclusion of the regional consultations and online idea collection, two Latvian CSOs (Providus, LPA) wrote the summary report.

Users, Stakeholders & Beneficiaries

About a half of all citizens’ consultations were organised by civil society organisations active either locally or at the national level, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs provided funding to cover their expenses. In parallel to regional consultations, the ideas on the future of Europe were collected on the online platform Dialogi par Eiropas Nākotni. At the conclusion of the regional consultations and online idea collection, two Latvian CSOs (Providus, LPA) wrote the summary report.

Innovation Reflections

Results, Outcomes & Impacts

The project is finished, but it is sill relevant in context of Latvia's deliberations on the future of Europe. Even those these consultations were held specifically for the European Council of December 2018, the insight gained during consultations events is still relevant. Main conclusions of summary report were presented by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Latvia to the Parliament in January, 2019 for their annual deliberations on Latvia's Foreign and European policy. It is expected that the summary conclusions will be important for the Prime Minister of Latvia during informal European Council on the future of Europe in Sibiu (May, 2019)

Challenges and Failures

1) It was not easy to coordinate information exchange between organisers of different events.
2) We would have preferred to have more time to organise the events.
In the future, we would suggest a more closely coordinated consultation process throughout the EU. A common schedule of events would allow us to link up via the internet participants in Latvia with participants in similar consultation processes in other Member States. This would encourage participants to see themselves more clearly as Europeans deliberating together on the future of Europe.

Conditions for Success

It was important that the state institution - Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Latvia - is not afraid of experimentation and does not try to micromanage the events organised by civil society organisations.

Replication

We will try to replicate conversations on the future of Europe in 2019-2020

Lessons Learned

With the benefit of hindsight, there were several particularly successful elements in Latvia’s
Citizens’ consultations in Europe, notably the following:
1) The innovative digital platform made it possible to involve a large number of people
in idea sourcing as well as put those ideas for voting in order to test their popularity.
2) The most successful events were structured as conversations and brainstorms having
maximum participant engagement and minimal thematic input from the moderator
and/or experts.
3) Inviting local civil society organisations to organize part of consultations and covering
their expenses in organizing such events. It was the local civil society organisations
who proved to be the best in attracting general public to their events, sometimes
linking consultations on the future of Europe with other topics relevant to their
respective municipalities.
4) Finding media partners for idea crowdsourcing on the future of Europe. The public
broadcasters’ website lsm.lv informed a broader public both about the interim
results of the voting and embedded in its platform a widget that allowed its audience
to propose new ideas.